Surgical dressing



Oct. 18, 1938. w. EUSTIS suRGicAL DRESSiNG Filed July 20, 1954 lNi/ENTO/j. W m

ATTORNE 25 dressing can readily be stripped off the gauze caradhere. Certain of these gauze sections or strips Patented Oct. 1a, 1938 a 2 133, 99

UNITED STATES-PATENT OFFICE SURGICAL nass smc Warner Eustia, Newton, Mass., asslgnor to The Kendall Company, Walpole, Mass., :1. corporation of Massachusetts Application July 20, 1934, Serial No. 736,177 11 Claims. (01. 128-156) This invention relates to surgical dressings, tively. Each of these dressings consists of a short bandages, and similar products. length of adhesive tape which, in a typical in- A type of dressing much used by the general stance, may be about three inches long, and has public consists of a short section of adhesive tape a pad P secured to the central portion thereof by carrying a small medicated pad which usually is the adhesive coating. While the character of the 5 located at an intermediate point in the length of oat ng may vary substantially, that most comthe tape and is adhesively fastened to it. Such monly used commercially is normally tacky and dressings have been sold heretofore chiefly in will adhere either to itself or to a great varie-, packages, each package containing a certain ty of non-adhesive surfaces. Such tapes are designated number of separate dressings. Since widely used and are well known in this art. The 10 the adhesive coating on the tape is normally pad P may consist of a small body of gauze, abtacky, it is necessary to protect it in some way sorbent cotton, the like. and r q n ly these and this is commonly effected by covering the ad- P s are impregnated with some germ p phesive area with gauze, crinoline, or theilike. Reoration. such as mercurochrome. As above indi- 15 gently n improved form for packaging dressings cated, dressings of this. construction have been 16 of this type has been devised which consists in on the market for several y attaching a series of separate dressings to a strip According to the present invention these dress of gauze in such a manner that the dressings are ings are secured together in approximately an supported on and carried by the gauze so that end to end relationship by means of relatively 20 the entire strip can be rolled on to a spool and short sections of gauze, crinoline, or other sheet 20 conveniently enclosed in a suitable wrapper or material which, in addition to connecting the casing. This arrangement has the advantage of dressings together, also serve to protect the adprotecting the dressings and presenting them in a hesively coated surfaces of the dressings from form convenient to use, since any individual contact with other surfaces to which they might rier whenever it is needed. are indicated at 5, 6, 1 and 8, respectively. Con- The present invention aims further to improve sidering for the moment the dressing 3, it will be a pe e t the form in w ch b nda or dress observed that it is connected to the dressing 2 ings of this general character are prepared for re? by t trip 6 of gauze and to the dressing 4 by tall distribution with a view to reducing the exanother trip l th t practically the entire 30 D nse involv d in Such p ep Pmviding adhesive surface of the backing strip of the dressconstruction which will lend itself to manufacture m (other than t rt r d by the pad by automatic mach ner p es the edven- P) is protected by the two strips of gauze, and tages of the imp oved f r o package above that these strips operatively connect the dressings scribed, and fac li ating t e p e o handling by their adhesion to the tacky surfaces of the 35 d use Of th yp (if p sections of adhesiye tape. Each dressing is sim- The nature of the invention will be readily ilarly connected to its neighbor, so that the gauze understood from the following description when sections connect th dressings adhesiveiy but read in-connection with the acc mp y drawseparably together to form a continuous strip 40 c. and the n v features will e particularly which may be folded, wound on a roller, or put pointed Out in the appended claimsup in any other convenient manner.

In the drawing Preferably the ends of each pair of adjacent Figure 1 is a perspective View of a dressing strips of gauze such,'for example, as those shown Package embodying features of tms mvermon; at 6 and I, are overlapped upon the pad of the 45 Fig. 2 is a plan view of a portion of the'dressing dressing to which both are secured This strip illustrated in 1; rangement is of advantage in removing any indiz iigg z ag s gs i sz z of the dress vidual dressing from the dressing strip. Usually ings and a portion of the protective Sheet mate the endmost dressing is removed whenever one is rial associated therewith; and required. If we assume that it is desired to re- 50 Fig 5 1s a perspective View illustrating a f move the dressing 2 in Fig. i, it is simply necesther embodiment f the invention. sary to strip the gauze 5 off this dressing by The dressing strip illustrated in the drawing grasping the free end of h gauze cu e comprises a series of individual dressings, ceraway from the backing ip- Then the free tain of which are indicated at 2, 3 and 4, respecend 0f the other gauze Section 6 may be grasped 55 cover, but they have been shown somewhat separated from the pad in the drawings in order to illustrate the construction more clearly.

When such a dressing strip is wound on a spool or into the form of a roll, it may be protected in any convenient way as, for example, by enclosing it in a box in much the same manner as rolls of surgeon's adhesive tape are commonly sold. Fig. 1 shows such a dressing strip wound on a spool it, this spool having metal heads over which a sleeve l2 may be snapped to cooperate with the heads in closing and protecting the dressing material.

A package of this kind preserves all of. the more important advantages of the present commercial arrangements for putting up dressings of this general type, such for example, as protecting the dressings from soiling or contamination, facilitating the easy removal of the individual dressings, and the like. In addition, it lends itself readily to manufacture by automatic machinery, it reduces the quantity of gauze or crinoline required by the more recent and better packages, and it holds all of the dressings together in substantially a continuous strip, avoiding any opportunity for the dressings to swing out of line and cause trouble in winding, folding, or the like.

A further advantage is the fact that any necessity for using a knife or scissors to 'cut away surplus the uncoated or back surface of the tape of the gauze, or for any other purpose, is avoided. It should also be noted that as the. dressings are successively removed from the end of the strip, the length of the strip is correspondingly shortened so that there is never any surplus material in the strip other than possibly the very short end of gauze which may project beyond the extremity of the endmost dressing. Since each dressing is complete in itself, its separation from an adjoining member of the strip does not leave a torn or ragged edge, but all the edges of the dressing are clean.

These advantages are also obtained in the form of the invention illustrated in Fig. 5 in which the end portion of the tape section of each dressing is overlapped upon a corresponding member of the next adjacent dressing and is thus adhesively but releasably secured to it. Considering any individual dressing, as for example that shown at 3', Fig. 5, it will be observed that its adhesive coating on the end thereof at the left of the pad P is protected by the fact that it overlaps next adjacent dressing 4'. The lower coated surface of the section .of tape so overlapped, however, is protected by a strip of gauze, crinoline,

or the like a. The corresponding portions of each of the tapes are similarly protected by short additional sections of gauze. Preferably, also, each lower end of the tape overlaps the pad P of the next adjacent dressing and terminates on said pad. Likewise the ends of the gauze sections overlap this pad. Since the surface of the end portion of the tape which comes in contact with the pad is the uncoated surface, it does not adhere to the pad, and by having it overlapped upon the pad in this manner, it is a very easy matter for the user to grasp this free end of tape between the thumb and fingers while hand stripping ofi the end portion of an adjoining dressing. It is for the same reason that the ends of the gauze sections are overlapped upon the pads. In this embodiment of the invention the area of gauze or crinoline required to protect the adhesively coated surfaces is further reduced.

It should be observed that in both of these embodiments of the invention the individual dressings are adhesively connected to form a continuous, self-supporting dressing strip from which an' individual dressing may be stripped oil, when desired. Since the continuity of the strip depends upon the adhesiveness of portions of the dressings themselves, the strip may be separated at practically any desired point simply by breaking the adhesive union between one of the dressings and the next adjacent element of the strip. This is a convenience when it is desired to remove a series of dressings for any reason.

Having thus described my invention, what I desire to claim as new. is: g

1. A dressing strip comprising a series or individual dressings, each including a portion coated with an adhesive, andsectlons of sheet material adhering to and protecting the adhesively coated surfaces of said dressings and connecting said dressings together to form a continuous dressing strip, adjacent sections of said sheet material having end portions overlapping each other upon an intervening dressing to provide free ends which may be grasped to facilitate the removal of the protecting sections from the individual dressings.

2. A dressing strip comprising a series of individual surgical dressings, each' including a relatively short section of adhesively coated tape, said sections of tape being overlapped, one upon another, toconnect said dressings together in a series relationship, each of said dressings including. a pad and the end of the tape of one dressing being overlapped upon the pad of the next adjacent dressing 3. A dressing strip consisting of a series of individual adhesive surgical dressings, each compris'ng an adhesive tape, a pad secured to the tape and a section of sheet material adhering to and protecting an adhesive surface of said tape, each section of sheet material being of a length to extend from its respective tape into overlapping relation with the absorent pad on an adjacent tape, said dressings being connected through the medium of the adhesive on the individual dressings to form the dressing strip, the

continuity of which depends upon said adhesive, whereby an individual dressing may be pulled off the end of said strip whenever desired by breaking its adhesive union with the strip, thereby shortening the length of said strip as successive dressings are removed.

4. A dressing strip comprising a series of individual adhesive surgi al dressings, each including a section of tape coated with a normally tacky adhesive and a pad thereon, and a protective sheet extending over an adhesive surface of one tape into overlapping relation with the pad on an adjacent tape, said dressings being normally vidual dressings each including a portion coated with an adhesive, a pad, and sections of sheet material adhering to and protecting the adhesively coated surfaces of said dressings and connecting said dressings together to form a continuous dressing strip, adjacent sections of said sheet material having end portions overlapping each other upon an intervening pad to provide free, non-adhesive ends normally protecting said pad, and which may be grasped to facilitate the removal of the protecting sections from the individual dressings.

6. A dressing strip comprising a series of individual adhesive surgical dressings adhesively united to form a continuous separable self-supporting dressing strip from which an individual dressing may be separated when desired merely by breaking its adhesive union with said strip, and including protective elements each covering portions of the adhesive areas of two adjacent dressings and of a pad in the mid-section of each of said adhesive dressings, said protective element having an end lying freely over said pad so that said end may be grasped for purposes of detaching same from the dressing.

7. A dressing strip comprising a series of surgical dressings each including relatively short sections of adhesively coated sheet material and a series of connecting members adhesively but separably united to said individual dressings, each connecting member being free from said adhesive at both ends.

8. A surgical dressing strip comprising a series of individual adhesive surgical dressings having at both ends of each dressing, portions coated with a pressure-sensitive adhesive, and a series of connective pieces adhering to said adhesive portions of said dressings, each of said connective pieces being free of said adhesive at both ends and each of said connective pieces also serving to hold together two adjacent surgical dressings to form a continuous strip from which individual dressings may be separated.

9. A dressing strip comprising a series of individual adhesive surgical dressings, each dressing including a tape section coated with adhesive,

tively short section oftape pads between the ends of said dressings and of such size and so located as to leave adhesive areas uncovered by said pad at both ends of each tape section, pieces of protective sheet. material covering one adhesive end of each dressing, the opposite adhesive end of each of said dressings being adhesively attached to the back of the portion of the tape of an adjacent dressing which is covered on the opposite face by one of the I aforementioned protective sheets, whereby the strip may be parted at the end of any individual dressing by breaking its adhesive union with the next adjacent dressing and thus to separate such individual dressings from the dressing strip.

10. A dressing strip comprising a series of individual surgical dressings, each including a relatively short section of tape coated with a normally tacky adhesive and having a pad secured to the coated surface of the tape, a portion of the tape of each of said dressings. being overlapped upon and adhesively secured to a part of the next adjacent dressing to secure said dressings togetherin a series relationship to form a dressing strip from which the endmost dressing may at any time be removed by breaking its adhesive union with the next adjacent dressin and each of said dressings including a strip of sheet materialadhering to and protecting part of the coated surface of the tape with an end of said protective strip overlapped on one of said pads.

11. A dressing strip comprising a series of individual surgical dressings, each including a relacoated with a normal- 1y tacky adhesive and having a pad secured to the coated surface of the tape, said sections of tape being adhesively overlapped, one upon another, to connect said dressings together in a series relationship to form a dressing strip from which the endmost dressing may at any time be removed by breaking i adhesive union with the 7 next adjacent dressing, each of said dressings including a pad and a protective strip of sheet material on the coated surface of the tape with its end overlapped on the pad but free from it.

WARNER nos'rrs. 

